my family did the same because many were american indians my irish grandparents were hated by their english neighbors my husbands family were german but forbade their kids from even learning the language for fear that they would be treated badly by their neighbors during ww thankfully our japanese family members lived in hawaii where there were too many of them to be imprisoned during ww if you look back far enough there will be some kind of secrets hiding back there its really ridiculous that people get so weird about race or color we all bleed red